GroupBy – Free SQL Server Training

GroupBy.org is free technical training by the community, for the community. Volunteer speakers submit abstracts at GroupBy.org and you – the attendee – vote to pick the sessions. Want to present your own session or just vote on others? Join us at GroupBy.org.

What do you want to be when you grow up? I want to be a DBA, a teacher, a blogger, and a world-traveler. I'm living my dream.

In this session, we'll talk about how I got where I am, and how you can get to where you want to be. In addition to sharing my journey, I'll give some helpful tricks to getting your next job. You'll learn how to write a resume that gets you noticed, and how to avoid writing a resume that lands in the trash. I'll finish by teaching you how to navigate interviews, and how to decide if a potential job and employer is right for you.

Whether you love or hate buzzwords, the big ones signify critical cultural changes. In this session, Kendra Little will explain what executives mean when they describe a 'digital transformation', why this transformation is happening across all industries, and how understanding this gives developers and database administrators an advantage in building their careers. You will learn what motivates CEOs to modify their business models in a digital transformation, and patterns and anti-patterns of companies that have attempted these transformations – with different results. You'll leave the session with an understanding of the core ideas and philosophies behind digital transformation that will help you prioritize what to learn, guide your interactions at work, and strategize your career path.

A new release of SQL Server is like a new season of your favorite TV show. Some releases in the past were lacking; I always felt like SQL Server 2008 R2 was about as exciting as the Seinfeld finale. But Microsoft hasn't disappointed in recent years, and SQL Server 2019 is no exception.

There are some really exciting features here. Some are big-ticket items, like support for Secure Enclaves, which provide all the benefits of Always Encrypted but without the client round trips. Others are smaller but powerful improvements, like deferred table variable compilation, and better error messages. Some are in between, like enhancements to batch mode, more online operations, and query hints to target specific compatibility levels.

With plenty of demos, I'll show how these features will improve your performance, security, workflow, or all three. And when necessary, I'll point out pitfalls or gotchas that you won't find in the official documentation.

These and many other features are worth talking about, so let's talk about them!